Corsi di Studio del Dipartimento di Culture, Politica e Società

International Cooperation for Development: Practices and Project Design

International Cooperation for Development: Practices and Project Design

Anno accademico 2018/2019

Sachs W., The Development Dictionary. A Guide to Knowledge as Power, Zed Books, 2010.
Berman, Marshall. 1983. All That Is Solid Melts into Air: The Experience of Modernity. London: Verso. Chapter 1, Goethe's Faust: The Tragedy of Development, 37-86.

Sommario insegnamento

• Obiettivi formativi
• Risultati dell'apprendimento attesi
• Modalità di insegnamento
• Modalità di verifica dell'apprendimento
• Attività di supporto
• Programma
• Testi consigliati e bibliografia
• Note
• Strumenti didattici

Obiettivi formativi

This course contributes to the realization of the study curriculum by providing the students with the key conceptual and analytical tools for understanding the logic, approaches, evolution and geography of international development cooperation, with an inter-and multidisciplinary approach, enhancing the connectivity capabilities of geographic knowledge, and giving them operative tools to understand rationality and structure of development project.

The course aims to guide students to mature their ability to apply them autonomously and to encourage the acquisition of transversal skills that will enable them to activate such knowledge and skills in contexts and for different purposes.

Risultati dell'apprendimento attesi

At the end of the course the student will be able to
- Consciously use the essential concepts used in international development cooperation to analyze the main themes of the agenda, as defined in United Nations Agenda 2030 (knowledge and understanding skills);
- Recognize and reconstruct the theoretical approaches to international co-operation and related development views, including methodological problems that raise (knowledge and understanding skills);
- Apply the conceptual and methodological tools learned to analyze the main dynamics of international co-sympaction to contemporary development, different levels and different types of flows and actors (international organizations, governments, local authorities, NGOs, philanthropic associations, private sector) (knowledge and applied understanding skills);
- Critically discuss activities and approaches in international development cooperation, and cultural and political representations and paradigms that guide public debate by influencing decision-makers and the public (autonomy of judgment);
- know how to deconstruct in the essential terms and know how to identify and define in general terms and operational the problems and objectives of international cooperation projects (evaluation and application skills)
- activate the notions learned in situations and for different purposes thanks to the transverse skills developed (in particular, active reading and synthesis skills, critical thinking, problem solving, knowledge and writing skills, teamwork ability, design) (communicative and diverse skills)

Modalità di insegnamento

Lectures, seminars and presentations by experts in the world of development cooperation, exercises in groups for attending students

Modalità di verifica dell'apprendimento

Each module of 3 cfu will have an evaluation that will contribute 25% to the final grade. In particular, for attending students:

• module 1 (prof. Dansero): a written text (semi-structured, with 2 short essays and one wider essay chosen from multiple questions)

• module 2 (prof. Pellegrini): an essay (3,000 words). Alternatively, if class size allows, participatory workshops (debates, people's tribunal, etc) will conclude the module and participation will be graded  

• module 3 (prof. Alvanides): design, authoring, publishing an online Story Map

• module 4 (prof. Dansero): (TBC: project design of proposals; practice based experiential learning. Evaluation of students' learning in the module will be based on the quality of the project design exercise.

For NOT attending students please look to Moodle platform https://elearning.unito.it/scuolacle/enrol/index.php?id=409.

Attività di supporto

Exercises and outside experts interventions are planned.

Programma

Module 1  - International cooperation: from continuities to the current SD goals; the origins, evolution, reasons, trends, policies (Introduction to development cooperation. (Egidio Dansero)

Module 1 is an introduction to Development cooperation, and will present history, approaches, typology, and main issues of development cooperation, considered at different scale, the actors (traditional donors of OECD DAC, new donors), conditionality….
 
Module 2 -  Post-development approaches and development cooperation towards socio-ecological transformations. Cooperation with grassroots, indigenous groups, social movements (3 credits)  (VISITING Lorenzo Pellegrini)

Module 2 will introduce the students to different conceptions of development and the way development as a project has been challenged. The discussion will be broad and touch upon modernity, economic growth, gross domestic product (GDP), socio-ecological metabolism, material needs and rights. On the critical side, steady state economics, the degrowth and post-growth paradigms will be discussed together with proposals concerning alternative development and alternatives to development.

The module will then move to the issue of development cooperation, starting with the mainstream discussion on the utility of development aid and the measurement of its effectiveness in relation to the impact evaluation methodology (especially randomized control-trials). On the more critical side, we will connect the post-development discussion to development cooperation and we will focus on participation and empowerment of social movements and indigenous people. A special emphasis will be given to scholar activism, action oriented research and (extreme) citizen science.

Throughout the module several cases from the Global South will be presented, some of them analysed in depth, to illustrate different concepts and approaches.

Module 3 - Data & statistics for SDGs and geography of development cooperation. Analyzing and measuring SDGs and development cooperation activity: data & statistics for development cooperation, the role of OECD-DAC, open data, financial channels and tools, mapping poverty, the political geography of development cooperation, (3 credits) (VISITING Seraphim Alvanides)

Module 4 - Project design: programming sustainable initiatives, casting actor networks, participatory design, monitoring and evaluation, reporting (3 credits) (Paola Minoia)

The module will include lectures and workshops of project design through participatory methods, coupling research and action. Scope is to create partnerships, analyze socio-spatial and environmental realities, support agency for sustainable transformations and promote evaluative processes. Practical exercises of project design will support experiential learning.

General programme for Non-attending students

The programme for non-attending students aims to expose them to a confrontation between methodologies supporting socio-ecological transformations of social groups as active subjects and agents, and the mainstream, western-led aid interventions. In line with the idea that cooperation actions should be grounded on recognition of diverse ontologies and epistemologies of the subjects, Escobar's book proposes an ontological approach to design, and design for transitions; and positions the relations among autonomy, design, and the political activation of relational and communal logics at the center of the transitions. The second part of the programme looks at the classical, western-oriented approaches to development actions, from the perspective of the funding agencies and regulated through the project cycle, theory of change and logical framework approaches etc. Proposed as "neutral", they fit in the priorities of Aid policies of the funders and guide the financialization of aid. Students will familiarize with these mechanisms for project design with the intent of learning how to use them, possibly in line of the priorities of non-western subjects, as Escobar's book suggests.

Students should complete their formation on a selection of lecture notes that will be available during the course.

Module 1

Lecture notes by the teacher and other papers in English (available at the beginning of the courses and shown in "educational materials").

Module 2

The module will be supported with readings that include book sections, academic articles, products from media. The detailed list will be available at the beginning of the course.

Module 3

Online readings on SDG stats construction and measurement

Background on mapping SDGs

Module 4

Learning material will be based on articles and UN-EU reports indicated by the teacher during the course.

Texts for Non-attending students

1) Lecture notes by the teachers (available as "teaching materials" on the Moodle page of the course)

1.1) What is development cooperation (Alonso, Glennie, 2015) (available on Moodle)

1.2) International development cooperation. Set of lectures (Bartenev, Glazunova, eds., 2013) (please use glossary and self-check questions at the end of each lecture) (available on Moodle)

1.3) The political strategy of external aid (Schunk, 2018) (available on Moodle)

1.4) Geographic perspectives on development goals: constructive engagements and critical perpsectives on the MDGs and the SDGs (Liverman, 2018) (available on Moodle)

2) Potter R., Conway D., Ewans R., Lloyd Evans S., 2012, Key concepts in development geography, Routledge (available in the Library “Norberto Bobbio”, Campus Luigi Einaudi).

Students that have already bought the book by Arturo Escobar (2018 Designs for the Pluriverse. Duke University Press) please contact prof. Dansero.

3) PCM and theory of change

3.1) EuropeAid Cooperation Office. Project Cycle Management Guidelines. Aid Delivery Methods, 2004 (available on Moodle)

3.2) European Commission Civil Society Fund in Ethiopia, Basic introduction fo Project Cycle Management using the Logical Framework Approach (Umhlaba Development Services, 2017) (available on Moodle)

3.3) Unterstanding theory of change in international development (Stein, Valters, 2012) (available on Moodle)

3.4) UK Aid Connect:
Guidance Note: Developing a Theory of Change (available on Moodle)

Orario lezioni

Note

Attendance at the course is strongly recommended

• Materiale didattico
• Bacheca appelli
• Vai a Moodle
• Visita i forum